Thursday, November 10, 2016

The Election: My Thoughts...Take Them or Leave Them

In the interest of marking significant events on this blog how in the world could I not post what I'm thinking about this election period and result here? Now, I am doing this more so that I can go back and look at it later than so that you can get all inside my head and mad at me. I'm open to respectful discussion at any time. I get to be the judge of what is respectful. :-)

Many of you know by now that I am a political junkie. As a teenager I participated in local elections. I campaigned for a dear friend and worked the polling places. As a young mom I considered a run for the local school board. A few years later after moving to Lancaster County, I again got into the political world for a season. What I know about me and politics is that I can get lost in it. It can be all consuming and I have to be very careful. So....I try to retain some detachment from the process at this stage of my life.

This Presidential election has been unlike any we have seen before. I have experienced all kinds of swings in my feelings as things have progressed. I have marveled at how far afield our Country has gone....and then have been amazed that the remnant who remained are more than I would have guessed.

I have gone from confused as to whether Donald Trump was running as a joke or because he was serious. Whether he got more than he bargained for when it started catching on for him. How so many respected people could back THAT. For his behavior and way of speech was over the top and very offensive to me. I despised his bully persona. I one hundred percent wanted just about anyone except him. And there were SOOOOO many wonderful choices this time around. In fact, I am convinced that this is how we came to elect Donald Trump. The primary season was spread too thin.

I spent weeks so angry and frustrated at the media for falling for him. It was like watching a train wreck....the more obnoxious he was the more they covered him.

And then it clicked.

Donald Trump is crazy like a fox.

He was putting on an act every time he stepped on stage. He would run a mean and lean campaign by getting all the free coverage he wanted by putting up a caricature of himself. Larger and meaner than life. The big bully. But underlying giving us pieces of his real vision. I started hearing the vision through the smoke screen and it started to interest me.

Then he chose Mike Pence to run as his Vice President. Turn up the volume again. I became more curious. Really? This calm, respected and agreeable man had met with Donald Trump and agreed to potentially work side by side with him? Mr. Pence has a wonderful reputation as a strong Believer. So now we have Dr. Ben Carson, Mike Huckabee, Governor Mike Pence and of lesser influence on me Sarah Palin all surrounding and supporting Donald Trump. I had to pay attention.

The good news junkie that I am I have watched and read hundreds/thousands of hours of news from many sources all through this campaign. There is a television in my candle workshop and it is nearly always streaming news. For the record, you can't believe all you hear. lol

My stomach roiled in disgust when the video of Donald Trump talking in a terrible way about how he "got away" with things around women. I was mad. At him. But I was also mad at those who were strategically bringing these things out of the vault of history in hopes of bringing him down. We were on vacation in New York when a woman came on television to tell us about how a stranger on a plane came on to her. I knew she was full of it when she said that it was o.k. while he was touching her "on top" but crossed the line when he moved down. Excuse me??? Any woman who would be traumatized by this event would have been traumatized by any touch!! The two men who have assaulted me never even touched me. Their words and looks were enough to put fear into me. I have never forgotten it and I never will. The stories of the 11 women who came forward were all regurgitations of what he had said in those stupid moments while trying to impress Billy Bush who was being just as ignorant. I started thinking that if Donald Trump had been the aggressor he had pretended to be there would have been many lawsuits over the years. The man is loaded!! This had to be a smoke screen using his own testosterone against him. Eleven years prior. Nothing recent came to light. I had to forgive when he expressed his regret.

I also looked at his family. Carefully. They are amazing people!! His children are the most "unspoiled" rich people I've ever observed. They all work very hard. None of them will touch drugs thanks to Donald Trump's parenting style of talking about these things frequently. Mr. Trump doesn't even drink alcohol due to family tragedy. I respected both he and Milania for putting their youngest, Barron, first and making sure that he had a full time parent while the campaigning took place. Family was obviously a very high priority for Donald Trump. And it showed.

At the same time Hillary Clinton continued in her muck and mire following a pattern of disregard for the law. Nothing, it seemed, had changed since she and President Clinton were in the White House the first time. Voting for her was never an option.

So....the dilemma left to me was to figure out if I could vote for Donald Trump. Many of my friends were telling me that as a Christian I couldn't. However, I've never been one to follow the leader. lol
Wait! You tell me I must do what? Well, I have to seek the Lord in it before following blindly.

After hours and hours of watching, listening and study into who Donald Trump has been I came to the conclusion that he is a man in process. He is changing and growing.

The names he put forth for potential Supreme Court Justices were quality. He had already chosen Mike Pence. Ben Carson and Mike Huckabee were still with him. Other Christian leaders began to speak highly of him after spending time with him.

He got that our businesses are overtaxed and over regulated.

He saw the oppression of drug addiction that has eaten away at the communities surrounding us. Lancaster County has lost sooooo many young lives just this year.

He understood that loving the refugee doesn't mean throwing wide the door....but welcoming those who pass our tests for being quality citizens. His own wife has become a citizen here through the process and laws established for just such a thing.

He promised to work on our Health Care fiasco.

And so I became a Trump supporter. Not a reluctant voter. I bought in all the way.

On election day I hoped and prayed that others had seen through his "crazy" approach and would come out to vote. When Warren went to the polling place at his usual time and reported lines across the parking lot I got excited!! This was a first in our experience. Then others started reporting the same things all across the State. We had a chance of getting enough from the rural areas to counteract those from the cities who usually take the State into democrat status. Mom and I dragged a tired Jonathan with us after a long night of working so he could place his vote. He was sure it was a wasted effort since we are known as a very, very blue state. But we assured him that it was worth the effort. Imagine, then, our glee when we proved to be right. All of those people coming out really pulled it off. For now....Pennsylvania is RED.

The elation from the morning of thinking we had a chance faded into a heavy lump in my stomach as the day went by. Could this really happen? I mean, Mr. Trump really had NOT put his best foot forward through most of the campaign. He was so often pulled off the important topics. BUT, had he done enough? Had others seen through all of that to his heart and real platform?

The results began to come in. Shock seemed to be the response all around. The commentators on every network looked like a huge tragedy was happening in front of their eyes. But this was not a tragedy, in my opinion. This was the very heart of America speaking. We were pretty quiet for the most part in advance of this day. But we were thinking, praying and many were making the choice to attend rallies. Hearts were moved. Hope was setting in. Perhaps in this man we saw someone who would stand up to the rot and decay in Washington D.C. He didn't make nice with anyone who he didn't agree with on either side of the aisle. Trust me...I'm a registered Republican but I don't believe that label makes someone a good person or a worthy representative. It is just a platform starting place.

I stayed up as this amazing thing happened. Chatting online with friends who were also watching. Georgia came over to watch with us. The poor lady tried to leave a few times before finally tearing herself away. It was a Historic event for sure.

Mrs. Clinton chose not to come out and speak with her distraught supporters that night. However she did eventually call Mr. Trump and concede. I took some photos of the television as Mr. Trump and his exhausted family came out for the victory speech. Loved that poor Barron who was nearly asleep on his feet at nearly 3 am.

7 comments:

Amen, Becky. I am very much taking your thoughts as most of them are my own. One must pay attention to the people a man surrounds himself with. I was on board much sooner than perhaps you were because I recognized a likeminded person in Trump from about the second week. It's going to be quite an experience; it already has been. I found myself feeling sorry that John, who was such a supporter of this unlikely candidate, did not get the opportunity to vote for him. He would have been so proud. No less than a half dozen people have told me that they began paying closer attention when John began chatting with them concerning this election. That blesses me.

Thank you for a cogent, positive piece on this election. It stands above all others I have read in Blogdom.

well said dear friend. well said.the vitriolic stance i'm reading in social media is beyond vile. at one season in my life i was extremely political and out front about it to a fault. well read and fully informed. this time not so much as i need to choose my stressers and this one would have put me over the edge. so. i prayed. and i don't mean that flippantly. i **prayed**. i read between the lines of trump and media. voting for the dem candidate wasn't an option due to her history and present intents. what brought me to a final decision was realizing that the future of our great nation .. this precious republic .. was at stake. the repub candidate offered wise and worthy options for the supreme court. and more... but this is your blog and i've no need preaching to the choir so to speak. regardless, while trump was not my first choice, i see this as God's way to have mercy on our country. hope this all makes sense as i've only had a sip of coffee yet this morning. wink.

I took a long time in deciding, too, maybe longer than you. But I looked at the choices, I looked at what the party platforms were, I looked at all the things, and I prayed! In the end I came to the conclusion that for any real change to happen for the people of America, it was going to have to start with someone 'outside' the entrenched DC crowd.

I'm hopeful, and looking forward to some real change. The other side really believe in their ideology and I believe it is time for us to stand up for ours!

We read Trump's website yesterday with the list on what they'd like to accomplish in their first 100 days! Man! It's great! Praying that they will be able to accomplish some of it, at least!

Thank you, Ladies. I posted this with some trepidation. But I am also optimistic for our future! We must be in prayer for the changing of hearts....or at least for a willingness to try to work together. I believe we have been given a reprieve for this next four years. I hope we do the best we can with it.

Thank you for posting this, and we are in agreement I see. One of Trump's strengths is that he has promised to "drain the swamp" of political corruption. I am praying that his team will include wise people to know how to accomplish things, and I pray he grows in his faith and wisdom.

Ms. Becky, I'd like to thank you for writing your reasons. This whole political season, I've vacillated between avoiding coverage at all costs, and being disgusted with what I was seeing. Your perspective has me looking at it with fresh eyes, and perhaps understanding why someone would vote for a person I couldn't bring myself to support.

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All advice, percieved or blatant, comes from me, personally as a friend, should not be construed to represent any company that I work for or with.I am simply offering observations from life and experience. This is my personal blog and not intended for business purposes.